


Hurting

by Fictionista654



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Self Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:13:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23495107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fictionista654/pseuds/Fictionista654
Summary: Morgana hurts. Gwen helps.
Relationships: Gwen/Morgana (Merlin)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 63





	Hurting

**Author's Note:**

> CW for self harm and suicidal thoughts

Magic comes from pain, and Morgana Pendragon knew pain. She hurt deeply, terribly, horribly. Her heart ached day in, day out, and nothing could soothe it. The pain was always there, Morgana’s most constant companion, and she couldn’t help but prod around the edges, wondering if this feeling would ever go away.

Some days, Morgana couldn’t get out of bed. She’d wake up with a boulder on her chest, discontent in her blood. When she had enough energy, she would thrash about with unhappiness, beating her head on her pillow and scratching at her skin. These times could last for days or weeks or sometimes months, and Morgana always came out the other end paler and thinner with a harsh set to her mouth and haunted eyes.

Gwen’s first day of work coincided with one of these episodes. Morgana had not left her bed in two days, and she had been unusually caustic with her usual serving girl, who had left in tears. So Gwen, the blacksmith’s daughter, was sent instead.

Morgana was awake and propped up on some pillows when Gwen came in. “Who are _you_?” Morgana said distrustfully as she eyed this new girl’s cheerful-looking curls and canary-yellow dress. “Where is Mary?”

The canary girl looked stern as she set down Morgana’s tray on the night table. “You called the poor thing a frog-faced loon.”

Oh. Morgana had forgotten. She turned over in bed, pulling the blanket over her head, in an attempt to forestall any additional conversation.

“I’m Gwen,” said the new serving girl, clearly not taking the hint. “I’m your maidservant now.”

Morgana muttered something into her pillow. 

“What was that?” said Gwen.

Morgana raised her voice enough to be heard over the insulation of sheets and blankets. “Go away.” She was not usually so rude to castle staff, but just now her insides ached like bruised fruit; one wrong move, and she would tear. 

To Morgana’s surprise, Gwen listened and left. 

Then she came back. She had only gone over to Morgana’s wardrobe, not to the door at all. A blue gown overflowed her arms. “What do you think, my lady?” said Gwen, holding it up. “Do we feel like blue today?”

Morgana snorted. She refused to answer such a ridiculous question, when it was clear that she was going nowhere except perhaps to the window to throw herself out.

But Gwen persisted. Not with the gown, no, but with everything else. No matter how truculent Morgana was, Gwen never rose to the bait. But she had a quick tongue, and she learned the best ways to talk with Morgana. Namely, she didn’t treat Morgana like some breakable thing. She treated her like a person, who sometimes deserved talking-tos. 

“You look terrible,” Gwen said blithely one morning. “Like a vampire.” 

Morgana shrugged. She didn’t mind how she looked. No one was going to see her.

“Your sheets are horribly yellow, my lady,” Gwen said another time. “You must get out so I can change them.” And she wouldn’t take no for an answer, shooing Morgana until at last she crawled out of bed and sat on the floor by the window. She watched disinterestedly as Gwen stripped the bed.

“Oh!” exclaimed Gwen when she had gotten the old sheets into a wooden basket. “I forgot the new ones.” She reached over Morgana’s bed and rang the bell.

“You did this on purpose,” Morgana said in a small voice, but Gwen only shrugged.

“I ought to have checked twice,” she said. Instead of going about her work, Gwen came over and sat on the floor next to Morgana. She was wearing a homespun blue dress and had a pink flower in her hair; she looked ridiculously happy and healthy next to Morgana in her begrimed nightgown. 

Morgana lay down, pressing her cheek to the cool floor. Gwen stroked her head, and she flinched before easing into the touch. To Morgana’s surprise, Gwen began to sing a lullaby. 

“I’m not a child,” Morgana grumbled, but the simple words and the soft tune set her at ease the way few things rarely did. After that, Gwen sang to Morgana whenever the sheets were changed.

Unlike Morgana’s last maid, Gwen didn’t stay in Morgana’s chambers but went back and forth from her house in the upper town. Morgana was curious about Gwen’s home, and she even dropped a few hints.

“You could always come over,” Gwen said mildly. She was wiping down the table, though Morgana had not eaten at it in almost a year.

“Come over?” Morgana said in surprise. “Gwen, you know I don’t leave my rooms.”

Gwen gave Morgana a pitying look, and Morgana flushed.

“Shut up,” she said, though Gwen had not said anything.

When the table was dust-free, Gwen came to sit at Morgana’s bedside. “When is the last time you went outside, Morgana?”

Morgana had to think. The gears of her brain, rusty from disuse, turned slowly. “Last month, perhaps,” she said slowly. “Or before that. There was an execution, but I watched from the window.” Thinking of the execution put Morgana in a bad mood, and she didn’t respond to anything Gwen said for the rest of the day.

Gwen moved into Morgana’s rooms on a Friday. She moved in because that morning, she found Morgana’s sheets streaked with blood and her arms caked with it. She had cut herself with a paring knife, and she cried helplessly when Gwen found her.

“I want to die, I want to die,” wailed Morgana, her face screwed up, and Gwen held her in her arms.

“I know,” she said. “I know.”

Things were not always so bad. Sometimes Morgana had good days, and she realized that she quite enjoyed Gwen’s company. They read together, or embroidered, though Morgana hated embroidery. They told each other stories and made jokes and roasted nuts on the fire.

When Morgana was fifteen, her magic came in.

Gwen knew, of course. Morgana knew Gwen knew. By some tacit agreement, the girls never spoke the words. But when Morgana woke up screaming and lit all the candles with her mind, Gwen went around blowing them out again. When Morgana raised an unnatural wind, Gwen waited it out as she would any of Morgana’s snits.

Morgana’s magic terrified her. She dreamed that Arthur broke his arm falling off his horse, and the next time he came to visit her, he had his left arm in a sling. She dreamed that Uther gave her emerald-drop earrings for her birthday, and when the day came, she woke up to see them on her pillow.

The dreams, at least, did not harm anybody else. But sometimes Morgana’s magic would rise like an itch beneath her skin, and it was all she could do not to blast the walls apart.

It happened accidentally. Morgana dropped a glass cup, and it shattered on the stone. She went to pick it up, to save Gwen the trouble, and a large piece sliced neatly into her palm. She stood there, stunned, as the blood welled up. Her mind was suddenly so clear. With a precision heretofore unknown to Morgana, she lifted the glass pieces with her mind and fit them back together. The edges melded together neatly, until Morgana had an unbroken glass in her hand.

And so Morgana returned to hurting herself. She scored her body with pins and needles and broken glass, each mark a bit of mastery over her magic. 

Obviously, Gwen noticed. She noticed the first morning, when she pulled Morgana’s nightgown over her head and saw the markings on her arm.

“Morgana,” Gwen said softly, running her fingertips over the cuts.

Morgana turned her head away, hot tears leaking from her eyes. “Don’t,” she said, and to her surprise, Gwen said nothing more about them.

That evening, however, Gwen got into bed with Morgana instead of retiring to her cot in the other room. Her presence steadied Morgana, and, allowing herself to be held, she sank into Gwen’s warmth.

Morgana grew, and Gwen grew, and Morgana’s magic grew with them. She learned tricks to deal with it: fingernails pressed into the meat of her palm, teeth clamped down on the inside of her cheek. She bit until her mouth filled with blood.

Gwen brought Morgana down to the meadow, and they sat on the grass and read each other’s palms, which was something Gwen had learned about from her brother, who had been traveling.

“He’s so smug because he’s seen the world, and I have haven’t,” Gwen said grumpily, her fingertips still exploring the skin of Morgana’s palm. Her touch sent tingles down Morgana’s arm and raised a funny feeling in Morgana’s belly.

“One day, we’ll both see the world,” Morgana promised. “We’ll go adventuring.”

“With swords?” said Gwen. 

“Of course,” said Morgana. “And we’ll wear trousers, of course. You would look lovely in trousers.” Both of them blushed and looked away.

On Morgana’s eighteen birthday, Uther held a tourney, and Gwen and Morgana sat together in the stands. Beneath their skirts, their hands sought each other. 

“What did you think?” Uther said at Morgana’s birthday feast that night. “Did any men catch your eye?” 

Morgana fought not to look at Gwen. “Perhaps, my lord,” she demurred.

That night, Gwen brushed out Morgana’s hair—one-hundred strokes—and tucked her into bed. 

“Stay,” Morgana said, and Gwen did. They curled around each other, and Morgana shook with the need to hurt herself.

“What is it?” said Gwen, her breath ghosting along Morgana’s cheek.

“It hurts,” Morgana whimpered, and Gwen rubbed Morgana’s back.

“It won’t always hurt this way, you know,” said Gwen. “I promise.”

Morgana didn’t believe Gwen, but she shrugged and pretended to take the words to heart. But when Gwen’s breath evened out, Morgana slipped out of bed and went to the window. She unfastened the latch and pushed out the pane, letting in the cold night air. She climbed onto the windowsill and looked down at the courtyard. It was so far away.

“Morgana.”

The voice was calm, but Morgana could tell there was a panic running underneath. She didn’t like to worry Gwen, but she couldn’t help it. “I can’t do this anymore,” Morgana said dully. “I can’t, Gwen.”

Hands rested on Morgana’s hips. “Come down,” said Gwen. “ _Please.”_

Morgana rested her head against the frame. “I’m so tired of it all. The hurting. The—the magic.” She gasped the last word, almost unable to say it aloud.

“The magic,” Gwen repeated, as if she were tasting the words. “Your magic.” 

“My magic,” Morgana agreed, tears sliding down her face and plunking onto her collarbone. “I think it’s what makes me so unhappy, Gwen. I think it’s why I’m broken.”

“Morgana!” said Gwen. “You’re not broken. You’re _not_. Now please, come down. You’re scaring me.”

“I wouldn’t do this for anyone else,” said Morgana, and stepped back into the room.

“Oh, thank gods,” said Gwen, and Morgana noticed guiltily that Gwen looked terrified. “I hate you.”

“I hate you, too,” said Morgana. She paused, staring into Gwen’s wide, wet eyes. “No, I don’t. I don’t hate you. I love you. I love you.”

Gwen let out a breath, half-laughter, half-sob. “Do you know how scary it is for me to love you?”

Morgana held herself very still. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I never know if you’re going to be there in the morning!” Gwen burst out. She was sobbing, truly sobbing, in a way that Morgana had never seen before. “How am I supposed to love you if you don’t care about your life?”

Morgana didn’t know how to respond. She felt like the world was caving in on her. “I’m sorry,” she said lamely, and Gwen laughed bitterly as she wiped away her tears. Gwen was shorter than Morgana, just a bit, and Morgana leaned down as she brought her hands to Gwen’s face to rub away the wetness. She moved her thumbs across Gwen’s high cheekbones, her smooth cheeks. 

“Beautiful,” Morgana whispered. She didn’t mean to; the word surprised her. It surprised Gwen, too, who gave a tiny gasp.

“I won’t,” Gwen said, her chin trembling. “I won’t unless you promise not to hurt yourself again.”

“I promise,” lied Morgana, and brought her lips to Gwen’s.


End file.
